I'll take a break and think about this. I don't disagree with what you've said, but I still feel that a person can be their own leader. I'm simply not yet ready to concede the point.

Listen, you don't need to concede that point. I agree with you. Where we're having a problem is that you beleive that this is possibe now, while I am asserting that it is a longer process ("removal of training wheels" in my metaphor in synonomous with your "people becoming their own leader")

I'll take a break and think about this. I don't disagree with what you've said, but I still feel that a person can be their own leader. I'm simply not yet ready to concede the point.

Listen, you don't need to concede that point. I agree with you. Where we're having a problem is that you beleive that this is possibe now, while I am asserting that it is a longer process ("removal of training wheels" in my metaphor in synonomous with your "people becoming their own leader")

Allow me to clarify my position, now. I think an individual can make that switch fairly quickly.I figure, like you seem to say, that a society will not make such a quick switch.So I think we're all in agreement here.

I really like the OP Cain. I have considered the implications of Discordia in context of what I considered 'healthy Nihilism'. I see the potential for a Nihilism that is 'weak' when reason might indicate something in life to be unimportant and 'strong' when a major change is needed. Letting some vain things 'slide' and other crucial things never seem impossible because you know nothing is TRULY unchangeable. I think this would require an axis of sorts or ethos to guide the chao much like on a wheel. Wheels roll just fine on their own but DRIVING requires a firm guidance.

I'm going to chew on the thought more before I go any further with it, but this was greatly thought provoking.

Logged

You can't get out backward. You have to go forward to go back.. better press on! - Willie Wonka, PBUH

Life can be seen as a game with no reset button, no extra lives, and if the power goes out there is no restarting. If that's all you see life as you are not long for this world, and never will get it.

"Ayn Rand never swung a hammer in her life and had serious dominance issues" - The Fountainhead

"World domination is such an ugly phrase. I prefer to call it world optimisation." - Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality

"You program the controller to do the thing, only it doesn't do the thing. It does something else entirely, or nothing at all. It's like voting."- Billy, Aug 21st, 2019

This is goddamned brilliant, and if not for the bump I may have not dug it up. Thank you, bump fairies!

I don't exactly feel capable of contributing to this in much of a meaningful way, but I do have an example to add. One thing I think hasn't been brought up in this thread is that strong nihilism, as OP describes it, is not only tied to religion in the 21st century. Look at people I'll generalizingly call 4channers, where whether or not they browse 4chan is irrelevant. They don't blow things up for their beliefs (they just commit school shootings sometimes) but they think society as it stands now is disgusting and worth purging. They lock themselves away, with or without a circle of like-minded people on some website or another, where they form echo chambers for their hateful beliefs. They have a morbid fascination with gore porn and degradation of women - in fact they blame what they call feminism for ruining the world (see: MRAs who don't help men, but just shit on feminists). There was (is?) a whole movement cheering on Ebola (with a cute moe mascot to boot) to wipe out the world, or at least Africa, because this would somehow usher in an opportunity to rebuild the world as a better place. And it's all the Jews' fault.

I used to browse the chans a lot, still do sometimes, and I sure know that the "destroy everything" mentality used to appeal to me, in the darkest days. It seemed to be the only alternative to the toothless, coddling, moderate ways of mainstream society. But then I learned better. And Discordianism sure helped.